 |
 Norton AntiVirus 2005: Is it worth it?
by Andrew Cooper
February 10, 2005 - Part II
The good point about the program is that it's able to check all incoming and outgoing emails for viruses and remove them when it finds them within email messages. I saw this feature at work when I received an email containing a virus as an attachment to a good-looking Christmas greeting from an unknown person. In the screen shot below, taken from the program's Quarantine window, you can see the details of recent threat discoveries.
An interesting addition to the program is its Program Control option:
Program options
Thus far, we have seen only how the program performs its basic task: cleaning viruses and other unpleasant software off a computer. Now let's see what it offers users in terms of options and settings.
The branded Bloodhound virus detection-technology allows for the discovery of a virus for which the definition has not yet been provided. Bloodhound employs a heuristic examination of code contained within the inspected file and incorporates the newly found virus traits into future scans. It is an advanced method of pinpointing possible nondocumented threats that should be recognized and neutralized. The whole antivirus industry hails heuristics and behavior-tracking techniques as the future of antivirus activity.
Another new feature added to the 2005 edition is protection from Internet worms and Trojans, which have become top threats to home Internet surfers. This module acts like a mini-firewall program that blocks the best-known parasites from the wilderness of the Internet by creating special access rules for such applications.
Summary
Norton AntiVirus 2005 is quite functional and feature-packed. The mini-firewall program, heuristic search, worm protection, and rich scan options make it a powerful virus-protection solution.
On the negative side, its relatively high price (around $50) and avid appetite for system memory can make you look for competitive products. Furthermore, the developers have not provided an option to fully deactivate the program from starting at Windows bootup, making all your intensive tasks (such as game play and video editing) much slower due to real-time virus monitoring.
Verdict
Despite what the unhappy Internet users said, I had a positive experience using the program. Yes, your system will become slower, and at times even turtlelike; nevertheless, it will be much more secure. The program, though, has some discouraging points, such as the user's inability to fully disable it from loading once the computer starts, as well as its high price and its strain on memory and processing resources.
Back to Part I
|
|
